BAOS: Beer & Other Shhh Podcast

If you've been following our recent episodes, you may have noticed a bit of a trend towards low ABV beers happening in QC. This session trend has gotten so real that the newest brewery in Quebec exclusively makes session beers. Echo Session Ales, ran by TV guys JF and JP, are making some serious noise in La Belle Province with their first two canned offerings, a Witbier with whole oranges and a ha...

Quebec is home to some legendary breweries, but not many have impacted the cultural zeitgeist more than À la Fût. Located in Saint-Tite, about 2 hours north east of Montreal just past Shawinigan, the town is most famous for their Western Festival held every September. We've been told it rivals Calgary's Stampede. The town and brewery itself make you feel like you're back in old Western times, with...

Commonly renowned as one of the finest breweries in Toronto if not Ontario, Blood Brothers have been at the top of our interview list for some time. We swung by to meet the owners and Head Brewer Patrick back in March, so it was dope to finally get some time to sit down with Pat on the newly opened patio to crush some of their latest releases. We spoke about why Blood Brothers do what they do, the...

This is the episode we never wanted to do. On June 5th, we arrived at Montreal's Saint Houblon to interview Chris Needelman, Head Brewer, at their Little Italy location. We were told by the server that Chris had tragically passed away the week before in a car accident. Although we'd never met Chris and had only corresponded via email, the news hit us hard. It didn't feel right to just replace his...

You may remember Shawn and Renaud from back in episode #38 when they were contracting out of Oshlag. A lot has changed in these past couple years. The boys are now on the cusp of opening up their very own facility, conveniently in the same warehouse complex as Oshlag, this coming Saturday June 22nd. They're the perfect outcome for contract brewers personified. They built their brands over the past...

If you've been following BAOS, you know we're certified #hazeboiz, and Rouge River have been at the top of our list of Ontario breweries to interview. We finally made our way out to Markham recently to hang with Co-Founder and Head Brewer Jordan Mills for a quick chat before he judged a GTA Brews homebrew contest. We mostly spoke about why their hazy beer is so damn good, and Cee was stoked to cru...

Hamilton, Ontario has become one of the new frontiers of craft beer in the province. Grain & Grit opened in the middle of the HammerTown beer boom in 2017, and have carved a great niche for themselves with their bright taproom, inclusive events for animals and kids, and of course for their fantastic beer. We finally got out to the brewery to hang with Lindsey and Joe and find out why their Instagr...

Nine episodes ago, we brought our producer Tiffany on for a podcast about marketing in Craft Beer. The response was so overwhelmingly positive that we had to bring her back for another one! This time around, we delved deep into how we can all contribute to the growth of this burgeoning industry via all forms of marketing, including digital, offline, diversity, word of mouth, working with media + i...

Hochelaga-Maisonneuve is a neighbourhood that is really becoming synonymous with craft beer. With numerous breweries in the area, both OG and brand new, Le Bièrologue, a craft beer + wine store, has been a keeping fridges full in the neighbourhood for over 7 years. We hung out with owner David and Manager Paul-André to crush a few local gems and find out why the people of Hochelaga like to drink l...

Barrel-aged beer is always looked upon with reverence, both in the difficulty of nailing it and the fact that time is the main factor. Sean started Small Pony a few years ago and he exclusively brews barrel-aged sour beers - no rent beers, just the one fermentor, and time is the main limitation. Perhaps this is why his beers are so special - each are painstakingly and expertly crafted to create so...

A few years back when Ottawa beer was first hitting the map for us, Beyond The Pale were one of the breweries who grabbed our attention. Their tiny taproom in Hintonburg generated a ton of attention, which lead them to move to a humongous warehouse space to support their rapid growth. High school mates Shane and Rob, along with Shane's Dad, Al, built this thing from the ground up so we hung out, t...

The craft beer community is a beautiful thing, so it was a pleasure to finally bring on two of our closest friends in the beer world. Chris is a YouTuber, running the Gatineau-based Hops & Bros alongside his co-host Max (who's currently attending Niagara College brewing school), while Nathan is a blogger & Instagrammer, being our resident in-house writer here at BAOS. Nate was kind enough to host...

We're terrible. We haven't been to Ottawa for an extended period of time since the Canadian Brewing Awards back in 2017. Coincidentally, we connected with Justin, owner and brewer at soon-to-open brewery Stray Dog at the CBAs, and have been keeping in touch ever since. So when we finally had the opportunity to get out to the brewery, we jumped at it. We headed out to the nation's capital and hangi...

After numerous failed attempts, we finally caught up with the legendary Fred Cormier of Hopfenstark at his taproom and bar, Station Ho.st, situated between The Village and Le Plateau neighbourhoods. Fred has been brewing for a long time, he came up with some of the most lauded brewers in Vermont like Shawn Hill, John Kimmich and Sean Lawson, and brews some exceptionally made beers out of his new e...

While it's amazing to get an inside perspective of the people behind the beer, one element of the beer life cycle that often gets overlooked is the people who get the beer to the drinkers. Experience Bière is a fantastic beer store, known as a depanneur in Quebec, based in Montreal, with one of the widest range of beers in the city. We hung out with co-owner Olivier to drink some of his favourite...

The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) boasts so many breweries that even folks as prolific as us have trouble getting around to them all. Rainhard Brewing, located in the Stockyards aka Aleyards District, has been evading us for a while now but we finally made it down to the spacious, welcoming warehouse-style location to hang out with award-winning owner/founder/namesake Jordan Rainhard and Sales Manage...

Being that beer is both an art and a science, one key element of running a business often gets overlooked throughout the industry - Marketing. Our producer and Social Media Strategist Tiffany Alexis joins Cee, who just returned from a trip back home to Australia, for a full length chat about all things Social Media and Digital Marketing, Influencer Marketing, Public Relations and simply and clearl...

Mill River Brewing BBQ & Smokehouse sits in the gorgeous town of St. Albans in northern Vermont, and they really deliver something unique in the brewpub world. With fantastic smoky BBQ cuisine complimented by their Vermont-style brews, it's an entire family run organization. We hung out with the whole crew - owners Chuck Fitzgerald. David Fitzgerald and Mike Heth, brewers Levon and Caleb Fitzgeral...

Craft beer brings us to some interesting places that we otherwise never would have had the pleasure of visiting. The town of Vergennes, VT is one of those places, but a week or two back we swung by to catch up with Ian, brewer/owner/chef at Hired Hand. Their focus is on keeping their products as local as possible, from the beer ingredients to the food, and their passion is evident as soon as you w...

Switchback are Vermont OGs, and they were one of the first taprooms in the state that Cee and Tiffany visited back in 2016. We finally got down there to chat with the team for an interview - we hung out with Brewer Alex and Taproom Manager Sarah to get into the history of the brewery, to discuss their Ale being the most exported beer in Vermont and yap about brewery dogs. Cheers!   Beer Reviewed:...

Laval, the island just north of Montreal, isn't widely known for its locally brewed craft beer. That's because there literally hasn't been any for quite some time, that is until Les Insulaires opened in November 2018. Situated a short drive north of the main island, Les Insulaires is a gorgeous, Instagram friendly brewpub, bar and cafe that is truly providing a home for local brew heads. We caught...

It's been a while between solo episodes, so while Scott was in Montreal for the launch of our latest collab beer with L'Espace Public (Dreamsequel, a blackberry blueberry milkshake sour), we figured we'd get in a podcast focused on cellaring beer (and catching up with Scott). Running through the Dos and Don'ts and best practices of cellaring, we cracked a couple unique beers from Cee's cellar and...

For those in the West Island of Montreal, craft beer isn't an every day thing. There hasn't been a microbrewery in the region at all - that is, until now. Labrosse opened up in Pointe-Claire over the past few years and have been delivering fire brews those who wouldn't normally have access - it's a community service, essentially. We finally made it out to the brewery to hang out with owner Troy an...

We've had a bit of a run speaking to legendary Quebec brewers lately, so we were stoked to hang out with Jérôme, owner of the first brewpub (and first brewpub permit) in Quebec, Le Cheval Blanc, at their pub on Ontario St in Montreal. The OG brewer told some stories from the early days, we spoke about how he's seen the scene grow and why you should rinse with Budweiser between beers at a tasting. ...

Contract brewing is quite the controversial topic in craft beer, but traditionally less so in Quebec. We hung out with contract brewer Fabrice of L'Appât du Grain at the awesome Experience Bière (thanks to Olivier for the hospitality) to run through some of his more recent releases, including a Kviek Brut NEIPA and a couple witbier variants and chat about the pros, cons and challenges of running a...